Methods and computer programs have been developed in this laboratory which allow the accurate an initio calculation of the ground and excited state properties of molecules of some size. It is proposed that these be applied to the calculation of the vacuum ultraviolet circular dichroism spectra, as a function of molecular conformation, of a number of chromophoric groups which are important to biological processes. Circular Dichroism is, in principle, a sensitive probe of the conformation of sugars, polypeptides, etc. The extraction of such information requires, however, information as to the dependence of the CD of the chromophoric group on conformation and this requires some form of theoretical investigation. Experimental CD spectra are available on a set of five alkyl amino acids, on (+) 3-methylpentenone, a much studied example of the carbonyl chromophore and + -2-butanol, a model compound for the hydroxyl group found in sugars. Previous calculations of this type in our laboratory, while in good agreement with experiment, have shown the CD of transcyclooctene and the MCD of cyclopropane to be far more complex than suspected on the basis of lower level theories. In view of the fundamental nature of the amino acid, hydroxyl and carbonyl chromophores, we propose to study their CD and its dependence on conformation using our new techniques, studies which have not previously been possible due to the lack of ab initio quantum mechanical computational methods capable of handling molecules of this size.